


The Borderlines

by Aviantei



Category: Artemis Fowl - Eoin Colfer
Genre: Brotherly Bonding, Fowl Twins, Gen, One Shot, Twelve Shots of Summer, Twelve Shots of Summer: Second Raid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-03
Updated: 2019-11-03
Packaged: 2021-01-21 11:15:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21298541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aviantei/pseuds/Aviantei
Summary: [One Shot] Sometimes we can venture outside the lines, but only others can go above and beyond. [Twelve Shots of Summer: Second Raid]
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9
Collections: Twelve Shots of Summer





	The Borderlines

**Author's Note:**

> This one shot was originally posted on fanfiction.net on July 18, 2015. It was my entry for the [Twelve Shots of Summer: Second Raid] week seven prompt, "Limit Breaker"! I was thinking about the Fowl twins at the time and wanted to explore them a bit more. It's fitting that later this month we'll get The Fowl Twins book, which I'm looking forward to.
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

**The Borderlines**

By: Aviantei

An _Artemis Fowl_ One Shot

[Twelve Shots of Summer Second Raid 7/12]

* * *

The Fowl household had been reintroduced to coloring books, mainly because the youngest residents were at an age to enjoy them without eating the crayons. It was, however, the first time that such books had been taken to in such number and enthusiasm, as the first of the Fowl children had easily gotten bored with them and had moved on to creating his own pictures instead.

Myles Fowl had done much of the same thing, and preferred to cover blank papers with very rough outlines of what looked to be blueprints with heavily practiced writing. He had recently mastered cursive, and most of the alphabet was distinguishable, save for those nasty Gs. On the other hand, Beckett, his twin, was still enamored with the things, though most of the pages were filled with scribbles that had no place on anything sophisticated, let alone a coloring book.

Myles had learned a long time ago that he was the smarter brother—it was an easily distinguishable fact—but that didn’t mean that Beckett’s actions couldn’t absolutely drive him up the wall.

“You’re doing it wrong,” Myles huffed once again, standing over his brother. Usually Juliet would try to stop this sort of thing, but she had gone to grab snacks from the kitchen. Beckett paused in his frenzied scribbling, looking up but not hurt. Myles crossed his tiny arms, knowing his words would probably do no good, but pressed on anyway. “How many times do I have to tell you; you’re supposed to color _in_ the lines.”

Beckett looked back to the book, as if contemplating what the lines were on the paper for. And then, simply, he said, “Don’t wanna.”

Myles had known the answer was coming, really. Still, he couldn’t just let the matter go—his brother was destroying the whole point of coloring books in the first place! “Then why don’t you just use normal paper if you’re going to do it wrong?”

Beckett chewed his lip for a moment, clutching onto his crayon. “It’s not wrong,” he finally said, “‘cause I like it.” And just like that, he went back to his picture, scribbling all over the line art rendered faces of Pip and Kip.

* * *

At the age of twenty-three, Myles Fowl had become every bit as successful as one would expect of a Fowl, being a prominent presence in the business and academic worlds, much like his older brother. Fowl Industries had been passed from one Artemis Fowl to the other, and Myles stood as the second-in-command, working towards further expanding the company’s success.

He was used to attending a number of social events, mainly to improve company relations as well as striking up new deals. Most of them tended to be boring, but they were necessary, and Myles handled them with utter confidence.

But nothing had ever sent him into apprehension like the opening night of his brother’s exhibit at the Fowl Art Gallery.

Beckett had stayed attacked to the arts long through childhood to adolescence, and had claimed he could leave “all that stuffy stuff” to his “equally stuffy brothers.” The art gallery had looked good in business eyes anyway, which made it easy to justify from a business perspective. But Angeline had loved the idea, and had supported Beckett with every ounce of her love.

And Myles had been there several times before. Except this time it was for his brother’s sake, no one else’s.

There was the usual chatter of businessmen and art critics in the background, but Myles could hardly hear any of that. Several of Beckett’s early professional works were displayed across the walls, and they were all breathtaking. Abstract, yes, but amazing, absolutely captivating and full of talent for someone so young.

And the major piece was actually an entire display wall itself. Sure there was the picture frame, filled to the brim with an amazing landscape. But the frame itself has paint smeared across it, the landscape expanding outside the frame, growing into the vivid and otherworldly seeming images that Beckett was best at, an almost dark and sketchy hand holding a paint brush other the whole scene. If the walls didn’t have edges, it could have gone on forever.

Myles had known Beckett was working on something big, but not this big.

“It’s amazing, huh? Took my almost a year to finish it. I’m amazed I even painted it.” Myles turned to see his brother. Beckett definitely looked more the artist type: vest hastily buttoned, no suit jacket, sleeves rolled up past his elbows. Even though his appearance was messy, it suited him. It was completely different than Myles, who looked as if he had stepped away from the pages of a suit modeling catalog, crisp and clean. Still, Beckett smiled. “Hey, Brother.”

Myles smiled back, unable to come up with the words that could describe what his brother had created. Finally, he settled. “I think,” he said, “that maybe there are some benefits to going outside of the lines.”

Beckett laughed, playfully nudging his brother in the side. And they laughed a bit, embracing each other in greeting.

“Thank you.”


End file.
